A LOOK AT COR!! STRIPS: ROBBY HOOD AND HIS ONE MAN BAND, PART ONE

Robby Hood and His One Man Band was yet another adventure serial in COR!! that occupied two pages of the paper and lasted from 7th November, 1970 until 24th April, 1971 (issue Nos. 23 – 47). The black and white feature was illustrated by Ron Turner. The script was by Scott Goodall who is said to have written all adventure tales in COR!!

Robby Hood lived with his step-father and step-brothers who were always making fun of his name and place of birth (Nottingham) until he finally decided to run away from home and vanish into the Sherwood Forest. There he met a weirdly-dressed bloke named Muchflour Amber, one–time miller from the parish of Mansfield who spoke in a peculiar way and was seeking a fellow by the name of Robin Hood. Robby realised that the bloke was a spectre from the Middle Ages on a quest to find the long-dead heroic outlaw and join his band of merry men. Saddened by the news that Robin Hood was no longer around, Muchflour offered to become Robby’s faithful servant. One peculiar thing about the ghost was that Robby was the only person who was able to see him (well, apart from the readers of COR!!) while all the other characters of the feature were completely unaware of his presence so Muchflour never failed to catch them off-guard. It was a great advantage because the characters who Robby Hood and his “one man band” had to deal with were usually dangerous criminals. 

The series consisted of the opening episode in the issue cover dated 7th November, 1970 (No. 23) and four serialised adventures.

The first story ran from 14th November until 12th December, 1970 (issue Nos. 24 – 28).  The pair accidentally encounter two armed thugs who have kidnapped Miss Rushton, a millionaire’s daughter, and are holding her for a ransom of 20,000 pounds. Robby tries to free the girl but the bandits capture him as well and take both of their prisoners to their hiding place. Muchflour brings their treachery to an end with the aid of his ancient acorn of wisdom and a young stag whom he summons with a blow-horn. In the process of liberating Robby and the girl, Muchflour sets the crooks’ hideout on fire and grounds their helicopter. The girl reunites with her father and the kidnappers are arrested. Robby and Muchflour stay in the Sherwood Forest.

An episode from the first story from COR!! issue dated 5th December, 1970 (No. 27)

The second adventure span over the period from 19th December, 1970 until 6th February, 1971 (issue Nos. 29 – 36). Muchflour and Robby meet old Dan Spooner who has a smallholding on the edge of the forest. A construction company has bought Spooner’s land and wants him to leave. The evil foreman Herbie Bennett and his construction men try different dirty plots to drive the old man off his land and make him abandon his hut. Muchflour and Robby try to help the old-timer as much as they can but the construction men finally bulldoze the house. Spooner, Muchflour and Robby discover a maze of tunnels underneath the hut and meet a strange dwarf Bimbo who turns out to be the wicked foreman’s accomplice and lures Robby into a trap. Construction men capture Robby and carry him to their quarters where he finds out that the real reason why Bennett and his gang were so desperate to evict old Dan Spooner and demolish his house was the soil. It contains a high percentage of iron ore and the tunnels under the house were made by Bennett and his thugs prospecting. Evicting Spooner was a deliberate fraud because mining rights for the area would guarantee a fortune. The thugs dump Robby and Spooner in a hole and are going to bury them under tons of quick-setting cement but Muchflour pulls them out. They follow the crooks and make them confess by using the “noise torture” administered with Muchflour’s ancient super-loud blow-horn.  Herbie Bennett and his cronies are taken away by the police. Mr. Spooner offers Robby to stay with him, but the boy prefers the company of his invisible friend.

An episode from the second story from COR!! dated 30th January, 1971 (No. 35)

The remaining two stories will be covered in the second post on Robby Hood and His One Man Band.